I have to let my American bias show, and say I think I like this new French guy, he actually came up with a good idea that I hadn't seen comming.


http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/05/10/africa/france.php

Ignore the first half of the article, focus on the second/more important half. (If France can be part of the EU and the MU then so can Turkey)

I'm particularly curious what our Spanish and English friends views on this are.

Will be interesting to see what comes of this.

I'm not sure if you misread this, but Spain would be part of this and Britain wouldn't. I'll have to think about it though.

From spain here:
I very much prefer the idea of belonging first to the european union, and then to any comercial union they see fit. If they're not exclusive, cool, but I have my doubts any kind of mutual benefit can be organized with countries that aren't democratical, are famous for having corrupted or terribly corrupted leaderhip, hate each other with a passion or are just seeing how all their people take boats to come to europe (and in some cases doing nothing about it because the money they send home is most of the income of the country). Too complicated.

But your from Spain... the article says the Spanish are rejoicing!

People have/had the same thoughts about America working with Mexico, but apparently Mexico's government is actually improving 10 years later.

The reason I was curious about the English thoughts is because of the historical animosity between France and England, and the apparent animosity between France and England in the EU even today.

I only wish the experience between the U.S. and Mexico would give me more hope that economic unions can affect positive immigration reform, instead of the oppposite. (Though I guess that depends on which said of the immigration debate you are on. I.E. Apparently Bush is unwilling to crack down on --Illegal-- immigration because of the union with Mexico.)

Sarkozy was certainly a better candidate than Royal. But I wasn't particularly keen on either.

I was hoping Ségolène Royal would win, for both ideological and "I'll enjoy watching Americans try to pronounce her name" reasons.

On a world scale, Sarkozy is good win. He actually has the ability to bring France in a bit closer with the United States, and personally I would love to see economic and social relations improve with France, which is one of the few top economic powers with the United States does not have good trade relations with.

It would also be a pleasant change from all the French hating. (I wonder how many 'red-blooded' American's would stop singing the Star Spangled Banner if they realized it was written by a frog.

As for the Union, any trade Union can and will strengthen the economic power of the world, and if it is friendly with the United States, it might result in an economic power that can stand toe to toe with China, and possible prevent them from doing something brash.

Anything coming closer to the US ideologically (I'm not saying economically... economically should be driven by market forces, not what El Presidente wants) is a catastrophe.

The United States is still the number one destination of immigrants... how can the US be so ideologically 'evil' yet still draw the masses?

Although I do understand why the elite of third world countries dislike the US...

Yes, yes, people immigrate because they agree ideologically with the country they're going to, and obviously immigration figures are an accurate measure of who is "right". Clearly, clearly, the Mexican government must have negative rightness.

Your continued attempts to poison the well by painting me as a member of some fictional economic or intellectual elite don't make me particularly inclined to think that the US military sees fit to allow intelligent thinking among its enlisted personnel; then again, I work from a very limited data set on the matter.

Considering what my relatives who have served have told me, and how they act after leaving the military (see: belligerent), I'd say your limited data set is correct.

Wait, what was this thread about?

Well I will agree, a lot of enlisted have issues, I however am not enlisted, I am commissioned. Big difference. But anyways, it matters not.

Democracy and Capitalism are the "Ideologies" of the U.S. so, since you seem to agree with the economis, what exactly is your problem with Democracy?

While in actuality, America is a replublic, the "Ideology" is that of a Demoracy, just to better exlain my question.

The current political climate in the US is just like any other modern democracy - Except everything is shifted to the right; skewed if you will.

This is a country where not only it's acceptable for politicians to claim they believe literally that a magic man made men out of mud 6,000 years ago, in some constituencies it actually makes them more likely to win.

It's a country where bribery has been all but institutionalised in the form of campaign donations.

It's a country with copyright protection laws gone absolutely haywire, with legal measures that allow corporations to essentially make up their own copyright laws, killing fair use rights.

It's a country that invests more money every year in building bridges to tiny towns in Alaska and similar "pork barrel" projects than in its space program.

It's a country rapidly marching towards a bizarre sort of plutocracy with theocratic tendencies.

It's a country which has, for the last six years, accepted and in fact advocated the continuous erosion of civil liberties and privacy rights.

Saying that "Democracy and Capitalism" are the ideologies of mainstream American political debate is a silly oversimplification. Capitalism is the basic economic model used in both France and Iran, but those countries are wildly different; both Georgia (The country) and Norway nominally adhere to the democratic model.

No country is perfect, by during the last 100 years the US has gone from an exemplary democracy that served, dare I say as inspiration to the rest of the world, to what looks more and more like a failed state in the making. Approaching it ideologically is taking steps backwards, swimming against the current of history.

@Callia: You'd think the military academies of the world's (supposedly) strongest military would have higher standards.

ETA: And I regard all that with sadness rather than spite. Americans I know are, with a few notable exceptions, some of the smartest most interesting people I know, even the right-wingnuts. But that doesn't change the fact the US seems to be sinking fast.

I gape.

The world will benefit because Sarkozy will bring France closer to the US?

Urrr....

The idea that Sarkozy is good because he will bring France back to the US is a myth spread by the members of the 'Europe is decrepit' crowd. Europe is not a failing region; Europe does not need the US. And as much economic influence as we hold over them, they hold over us.

Sarkozy's hopefully going to be a better president not because of his foreign policy, but because he can try to break the post-marxist funk that's cast a spell over France for the last forty years.

Man the internet spreads a lot of disinformation.

Based on your above tirade, every 4 t o 8 years America changes its Ideology. Which is sort of, hmm, seems to me to go against the concept of the ideology.

In other words, what you mean is that you don't like the policies of the current administration, which are going to change completely, in roughly 1 year.

You should read some of the news articles written in the 20's 40's and 1860's by the minority parties which basically say the exact same thing you are saying now, with differences in the specific details.

Iran for example does not have an Ideology of Democracy, they have a policy of Democracy with an Ideology of the Iatola. Amercia does not have a policy of Democracy, they have a policy of a Republic, with an ideology of a Democracy.

Didn't read like a tirade to me. Read calmly and rationally. And I more or less agree with him.

I don't understand why you are quibbling about his word use when his meaning is entirely clear.

Fine, point by point then.




But anyway, I'm very excited about the prospect of the Mediteranian becomming its own Economic power. The divide between Africa and the rest of the world needs to be diminished.